Most of us spend the week leading up to spring break making plans for the following week or mentally checked out of classes. Wichita State tennis spent the week before break hard at work trying to finish their eight match home stand strong.

They managed to sweep their opponents Lamar 4-0, UMKC 6-1, and Air Force 5-2.

“I have so much respect for these programs,” said head coach Brad Louder. “My hats off to all three of these teams, but especially Air Force, they work so hard.”

Doubles play versus Lamar was split down the middle when Guillermo Nicol/Guillermo de Vilchez clinched the point with a 8-5 win.

Jocelyn Devilliers started off doubles play with a 6-0, 6-3 win and he was followed by Nicol and Tin Ostojic who won their matches 6-2, 6-4 and 6-4, 6-1 respectively to complete the sweep.

In the second match of the week, UMKC was able to score against the Shocks. WSU clinched the doubles point quickly against the Kangaroos. WSU clinched the match 4-0 with wins from Ostojic and Devilliers once again and Tomislav Gregurovic.

“We’ve had some good wins and a good week,” said Ostojic, “Our game is ready on the conditioning side so it wasn’t really a big deal for us to play three matches in so few days.”

With the match already in hand, UMKC’s Psarros Gaismins gave them their only point of the match as the other singles matches were won by Shockers to have the match end at 6-1.

In Wichita State’s final home match of the eight match stand they faced Air Force. WSU was able to take the doubles point as Gregurovic/Ostojic won 8-6 and Ilija Cuic/Devilliers won 8-7(7).

Singles play was a tough affair as Air Force came out of the break with new motivation. Ostojic and Gregurovic finished their matches within just minutes of each other to push the Shocker lead from 1-0 to 3-0. Ostojic won 6-1, 6-2 and Gregurovic 6-2, 6-3.

“Air Force is having a good season with some good wins,” said Louderback.

Nicol was able to win in straight sets 6-3, 6-3 to give WSU the win. Air Force was able to string two wins together, but it was a case of too little too late. Devilliers and de Vilchez both fell to their opponents which had the match set at 4-2.

“We came in with straight heads and focused on winning the matches,” said Nicol, “this is probably the toughest two weeks of the season, we’ve got three more matches next week. No spring break for us, but we can take advantage of not having classes and focus solely on tennis.”

Cuic was able to finish his match in a three set thriller to give WSU a 5-2 win over the Falcons.

WSU will travel to Texas while the rest of us relax during spring break to face some stiff opposition on Wednesday, March 19 as they compete against No. 7 Texas University at 6 p.m.